Here are the upward moves from last year in the graduate tax rankings:

Grad Tax

Program

2011

Rank

+1

San Diego

6

+1

Denver

9

In addition, Villanova was unranked last year and ranks #11 this year.

Here are the downward moves from last year in the graduate tax rankings:

Grad Tax

Program

2011

Rank

-1

Florida

3

-1

Boston Univ.

6

In addition, Chapman and U. Washington ranked #9 and #10, respectively, last year and are unranked this year.

The U.S. News tax survey instrument states that it is intended "to identify the law schools having the top programs in tax law." The survey is sent "to a sample of law school faculty listed in the AALS Directory of Law Teachers 2007-2008 as currently teaching a course or seminar in tax law." Recipients are asked "to [i]dentify up to fifteen (15) schools that have the highest-quality tax law courses or programs. In making your choices consider all elements that contribute to a program's excellence, for example, the depth and breadth of the program, faculty research and publication record, etc."

As Donald Tobin (Ohio State) has noted, it is more than strange that NYU has finished ahead of Florida and Georgetown each year that U.S. News has conducted the survey. Because the survey ranks the schools by how often they appear on the respondents' "Top 15" lists, this means that some folks list NYU, but not Florida and Georgetown, among the Top 15 tax programs.

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Comments

How could USC, with Thomas Griffith, Ed Kleinbard, Ed McCaffery, Elizabeth Garrett, plus some good adjuncts, be ranked as low as 16?

Posted by: GU | Apr 20, 2010 9:21:12 AM

RE: Tobin--One may enter only a single school on the survey. That would explain why there is not a tie.

Posted by: - | Apr 20, 2010 12:17:38 PM

I think, perhaps, that in this instance US News has finally got it right. Although Florida is a commendable program and on a name for name basis might win a beauty pageant, but JDs get LLMs in Tax to GET JOBS. NYU is vastly superior in that respect given it has a network spanning back how many decades? 5, 6, 7? and it is located in NYC so it can easily place all over the east coast and entrenched itself elsewhere 10, 20, 30, and 40 years ago.

G'town finally got its props. It merits #2 status as it may be the leading placer (even ahead of NYU) in DC which is the national tax hub, absent a few specialties (e.g., wall street, but transactional/financial stuff ain't looking so hot right now). IRS, DOJ, Treasury, JCT, Senate Finance, Ways and Means, you name it and the government tax people are virtually all in DC.

Again, this is not to say that Florida does not have a fine program. This is not to say that Florida has a program inferior to NYU or G'town (hell, it very well may be superior to both) but placement brings home the bacon in LLM land. And reputation counts. Just go as Harvard or Yale (law or undergrad) about the cache value of the school's name on a resume.

Posted by: tax guy | Apr 20, 2010 7:07:17 PM

I finished my LLM in Tax at BU last year...still looking for a job, as is pretty much every American full-time student in my program (around 100 people).

Tax Guy, you nailed it--we all got LLMs in tax to GET JOBS. And given that the program's tuition is $40k in one of the most expensive cities in the country, the result of our long-term unemployment is pretty stultifying. After 4 years of legal education and $130k worth of tuition, my sole income is now food stamps and I'll be lucky if I'm not homeless in 6 months. If anyone knows anyone hiring entry-level attorneys, please put the word out to one and all.